Alexandra was born on 25 March 1921 to King Alexander of Greece and his morganatic wife, Aspasia Manos. However, Alexander had died five months before she was born. Her grandfather Constantine I had been in exile and was restored to the Greek throne a month after his son’s death. This left Alexander’s marriage to Aspasia in legal limbo. Alexander’s reign was treated as a regency and the marriage was contracted without Constantine’s permission, making it technically illegal. Due to this Alexandra was born illegitimate.
With the influence of Queen Sophia, the girl’s grandmother, an additional law was passed in July 1922 recognising the validity of marriages of members of the royal family contracted without royal assent. This made Alexandra legitimate, but she continued to lack succession rights. Because of this she never became Greece’s first Queen Regnant as she would have become had she been born legitimate.
She and her mother were accorded the title ‘Princesses of Greece and Denmark’ and the style of ‘Royal Highnesses’. They moved around a lot, first to Italy and later to London and Paris.
In 1944 she married her third cousin, Peter II of Yugoslavia and she gave birth to her first and only child Alexander, Crown Prince of Yugoslavia on 17 July 1945. Her son was born in London, but the suite where she gave birth was declared Yugoslav territory for the day, and it was also the only time Alexandra was on Yugoslav territory. The marriage quickly deteriorated, and Alexandra eventually left her husband, taking her son with her. In 1953 Peter sued for divorce, and Alexandra retaliated by slashing her wrists. She was saved by a doctor. Peter died in 1970, never having been granted a divorce. 1
Alexandra settled in East Sussex, and she died from cancer on 30 January 1993. She was first buried in Tatoi in Greece, but in May 2013 her remains were transferred to Serbia to be reburied in the crypt of the Royal Mausoleum at Oplenac, together with the remains of Peter and his mother Maria of Romania. 2
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